New Orleans\u2019 Mardi Gras is more than just a celebration before the Christian season of Lent begins.

In this city, preparations for the big day begin weeksand even months in advance.

Early mornings are nothing new for bakers, but the pre-dawn workload grows during carnival season.

From January 6th through Fat Tuesday, New Orleans Cake Caf\u00e9 and bakery is a beehive of activity, where they make as many as 50 king cakes a day. Here, they make non-traditional goat cheese and apple stuffed cakes.

Steve Himelfarb, Owner Cake Caf\u00e9 & Bakery:

\u201cYou can\u2019t take it lightly. And you have to know the King Cake is the calling card for your bakery. There\u2019s very old-school King Cakes in New Orleans. They\u2019ve been at it 50, 60, 100 years some of them, and they have a loyal following.\u201d

The old-school king cake has a tiny baby or other trinket baked inside, and whoever gets the trinket has obligations, such as buying next year\u2019s king cake. Here, the baby goes on the outside.

Steve Himelfarb, Owner Cake Caf\u00e9 & Bakery:

\u201cThe King Cake is a traditional New Orleans Mardi Gras pastry. You\u2019ll find pastries like this all over the country and all over the world, and they\u2019re only served for a certain season during the year.\u201d

In another part of town, Sally Hedrick and her son are making 150 or more ornate costumes. These are for the social organizations throwing the lavish balls and parades. Some may go fore more than three thousand dollars.

SOUNDBITE: Sally Hedrick, Costume Maker

\u201cAs rewarding to see the women in these costumes gleam, but it is more rewarding to the men because a man doesn\u2019t get to dress up in beautiful clothes. He\u2019s usually in a tuxedo.\u201d

Hedrick works on costumes year-round \u2013refurbishing ones that took a bit of a beating during last year\u2019s Mardi Gras celebrations, and creating new works.

For a look back at years\u2019 past, the Louisiana State Museum lets visitors see more than a century and a half of New Orleans\u2019 Mardi Gras traditions.

\u201cThe way that we celebrate Mardi Gras now and for the last 150 years, revolves around what we call the krewe system. There are all these clubs that exist that are called Mardi Gras krewes. And the krewes are the ones that give the parades and the balls every year.\u201d

For the dozens of krewes \u2212 spelled with a \u2018k\u2019 \u2212 lavish balls highlight Mardi Gras.

The Knights of Sparta Krewe was founded in 1951. For the last 30 years they\u2019ve paraded in the city, and currently host a masquerade ball and parade that falls on the next to the last weekend of carnival season.

The krewe\u2019s captain does not publicly reveal his identity. He says it isn\u2019t about secrecy.

SOUNDBITE: CAPTAIN OF KNIGHTS OF SPARTA:

\u201cI wear the mask, however, because it is the tradition of Carnival to mask, to hide one\u2019s identity because when I represent my Carnival krewe, the Knights of Sparta, I am simply the captain. One should not know my name or who I am.\u201d

Belonging to or leading a krewe takes a big commitment.

SOUNDBITE: CAPTAIN OF KNIGHTS OF SPARTA:

\u201cIs very costly to the members of the organization paying dues, buying the trinkets \u2212 the throws as we call them \u2212 to throw off the floats, ball gowns for the ladies, tickets to different functions. And we do it because of a sense of tradition.\u201d

As Fat Tuesday approaches, warehouses throughout the city come to life. \u2018Float dens,\u2019 as they are called, house the floats that can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to construct. It can take a month or more to build and decorate the elaborate floats, some of which date back to the early 1900s.

SOUNDBITE: Philip Fricano, Jr., Float Maker:

\u201cIt\u2019s part of the economy here too. It puts a lot of people to work. To make a float like this, you need carpenters, you need artists, you need welders, you need tire people, you need mechanics. It\u2019s a lot involved.\u201d

And a final vital ingredient for Mardi Gras is the music. Grammy-winning artist Irvin Mayfield.

SOUNDBITE: Irvin Mayfield, Jazz Club Owner and Musician

\u201cFrom television you see these parades go by, people throwing beads. But what you really don\u2019t see is that Mardi Gras lives out in people\u2019s houses, it lives out in the street, it lives out in the halls and the parties and the receptions. And it\u2019s not a thing over one day. So I would say in terms of music, it\u2019s very hard to have Mardi Gras without the music.\u201d

And he says any musician growing up in New Orleans is shaped by Mardi Gras\u2026

SOUNDBITE: Irvin Mayfield, Jazz Club Owner and Musician

\u201cYou are a leg on the table that helps the table stand up. The music, the food, the people. For a young musician, you wouldn\u2019t start playing because of Mardi Gras necessarily. But if you are a musician, you will be involved in Mardi Gras a certain way.\u201d

Most New Orleans natives say anyone hoping to understand Mardi Gras needs to come back often and stay awhile, not just for one day.